Trump Declares ‘I Love the Inflation’ as US Prices Surge to Three-Year High

Facing the highest American inflation reading in three years, President Donald Trump offered a startling response: “I love the inflation.” The remark, made in the Oval Office on Wednesday after the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported a 4.2 per cent annual consumer price rise in May, up from 3.8 per cent in April, marked his most explicit rhetorical gamble yet on a cost-of-living crisis driven largely by the conflict with Iran. Energy prices surged 23.5 per cent year-on-year, with gasoline alone jumping more than 40 per cent, as Iran’s blockade of the Strait of Hormuz — through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil passes — choked global supply. Trump insisted the numbers were “great” and predicted that prices would “come down like a rock” once the war ended.

Viewed from Washington, the episode immediately deepened Republican anxiety ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senator Elizabeth Warren accused the president of disregarding the squeeze on households, while data showed real incomes falling at the fastest pace since February 2023. Trump’s subsequent claim to have secretly run 22 tankers through the strait “with no lights” — an operation he said Iran could not detect because “we blasted the crap out of” its radar — drew bewilderment. The energy secretary later clarified the president was speaking “casually,” but the damage control did little to quiet critics who recalled that Trump had once dismissed affordability concerns as a Democratic hoax.

European central bankers watched the inflation print with their own alarm. In Frankfurt, the European Central Bank signalled readiness to raise interest rates to contain the secondary effects of an oil shock that has hit both sides of the Atlantic. Italian business daily Il Giornale noted that inflation in the US stood at just 2.4 per cent before the war began on 28 February, underscoring how the conflict has rerouted global energy markets and fiscal expectations. Across the Middle East, Arabic-language outlets highlighted the bombing of Iran that followed Trump’s remarks and the broader destabilisation that has sent food and transport costs spiralling.

Asian and Latin American commentary reflected a mix of incredulity and concern over the knock-on effects for emerging economies. Indonesian and Brazilian reports pointed to a US leader apparently celebrating a data point that, in many developing nations, would constitute an acute political crisis. The Sydney Morning Herald offered the bluntest assessment: “Most American households would probably beg, loudly, to differ.”

White House allies moved to frame the remarks as deliberately taken out of context, with House Speaker Mike Johnson insisting Trump was referring positively to the economic data rather than to rising prices themselves. Yet the episode leaves the administration in a precarious position. If the war in the Middle East persists, the promised rapid disinflation may remain out of reach, and the president’s approval rating — already at a record low, according to Newsweek — could face further erosion. Analysts in London note that the combination of geopolitical instability and consumer frustration creates an unusually volatile landscape for a midterm campaign still eighteen months away.